I have been thinking about how our past experience can blind us to the potential of new technologies to provide a breakthrough experience. My favourite example is 3D movies. I remember the early versions that required red and blue glasses and delivered a horrendous image quality. Then there were the ridiculously bulky and heavy glasses used in IMAX 3D. Each time there were two reactions. First, 3D is not working. Second, who needs 3D in movies anyhow? The early failures made a lot of people go cold on the potential for 3D movies altogether. Thankfully, this does not deter true believers who kept at it anyhow. And then a funny thing happened. An accumulation of improvements combined in just the right fashion produced the breakthrough. Over the last couple of years more and more animated movies have been in 3D and my kids absolutely love it. To the point where when a new animated movie comes out they want to know right away whether it will be available in 3D. Still, many people are sceptical that 3D will ever be anything but a stunt for live action movies. Here too I believe it is a case of being blinded by the past. To-date 3D has often been a gimmick but that doesn’t preclude the possibility of a breakthrough experience for live action also. Maybe James Cameron’s Avatar will be that experience, maybe not. But it would be a mistake to write 3D off simply because of our past experience with it. This experience-based reaction is an especially big problem when it comes to Venture Capital. In VC it’s not just having spent 10 bucks on a 3D movie and not liked it but 10 million on a 3D company and not gotten any of it back. Instead of 3D you can substitute many other technologies, products or services in the previous sentence. The challenge then is to remain open to the possibility of a breakthrough. This is true not just for the VC firms that lost the money but for everyone in the industry. Especially because breakthrough experiences are in my view one of the key answers to Fred’s question from today about “What Drives Consumer Adoption Of New Technologies?” http://bit.ly/12IeBC
